Our Team

David Elman is a senior editor covering bankruptcy filings, court hearings, controversies, debtor-in-possession loans and exits as well as out-of-court restructuring situations. David also edits auction, M&A, activist and private equity articles and produces the weekly Restructuring Insider newsletter. Before joining The Deal in 2003 as a copy editor, David held the same role at Institutional Investor (now a sister publication of The Deal) and the Institute of Management Accountants’ Strategic Finance and Management Accounting Quarterly.

David Marcus is a senior writer focusing on legal issues raised by corporate transactions. David writes about the structure of merger agreements, Delaware law cases and developments and cross-border M&A. He has been a reporter at The Deal since its launch in 1999 and the senior writer on Corporate Control Alert — The Deal’s journal of legal and financial trends in dealmaking — since 1997. A 1992 graduate of Princeton University and a 1996 graduate of the University of Virginia School of Law, he also writes about wine for The Deal.

Ronald Orol leads coverage of activist hedge fund managers, a high-profile group of corporate investors who press for blockbuster deals and were the subject of his book “Extreme Value Hedging: How Activist Hedge Fund Managers Are Taking on the World.” Ron produces the Activist Daily and Activist Weekly briefings, which offer exclusives, trend pieces and breaking analysis about insurgent investors and their M&A efforts. Ron also authored “Corporate Governance in the Era of Activism,” a digital handbook for CNBC’s Jim Cramer. He previously worked as a financial regulation and activism reporter at MarketWatch and Dow Jones Newswires.

Jean Haggerty is a senior reporter covering shareholder activism. Prior to joining The Deal, she worked as an editor covering climate and agriculture at Gro Intelligence and as a reporter covering derivatives and risk management for International Financing Review.

David Hatch is a senior reporter covering antitrust in Washington, focusing on merger enforcement, competition law and policy. His specialties include technology and media transactions, cross-border M&A and national security reviews. David previously was a senior technology reporter with Acuris, where he contributed to Dealreporter and other business newswires. He also was a technology correspondent with National Journal and covered the television industry for Crain Communications. David’s publishing credits include U.S. News & World Report and Governing.

Donna Horowitz is senior editor of The Life Settlements Report, where she has written for since its launch in April 2007. She covers news of market developments, litigation and regulation. Donna previously was a reporter for the Oakland Tribune and Marin Independent Journal, as well as a freelancer for the San Francisco Examiner and the Los Angeles Times.

Bill Meagher is a senior reporter focusing on small and microcap equity finance, alternative investments, special purpose acquisition companies, private-investment-in-public-equity transactions and companies going public as well as regulation. He is a main contributor to the weekly PIPEs Report newsletter. His work has appeared in newspapers and magazines throughout California as well as on PBS, “60 Minutes,” ABC News and CNBC.

Chris Nolter is a senior writer focusing on telecom, media and technology. His coverage ranges from profiles of key bankers and dealmakers to the inner workings of complex deals, and he is often the first in the industry to report on M&A activity and private equity. Before joining The Deal, Chris published stories with FinanacialTimes.com, RollingStone.com, The New York Times Magazine and Columbia Journalism Review. He was an editor at Museum of the Moving Image and produced live news broadcasts for CNN Financial Network.

Nikitha covers the consumer services, franchising and retail industry for The Deal with a focus on middle market private equity.

She previously worked as a reporter at Bloomberg News and Cannabis Wire. Earlier, she was a freelance journalist in India covering agricultural policy and development.

Paul Springer is a senior writer covering PIPE transactions, SPACs, activism and restructuring. Prior to joining The PIPEs Report, he worked as a runner on the Pacific Coast Options Exchange and at firms including Deutsche Bank, JPMorgan Chase and Group One Trading. He has also been advanced to doctoral candidacy in Comparative Literature.

Alex Eichenstein is a reporter covering healthcare at The Deal. After graduating from Columbia Journalism School in 2023, she worked as a reporting intern at Honolulu Civil Beat, reporting on water access issues and the Maui wildfires.

Kylie Kirschner is a reporter covering the consumer sector at The Deal. She has previously worked at Business Insider, Forbes, and Mergermarket, and received her Master’s in journalism and international relations from New York University, for which she reported on the impacts of climate change and environmental degradation on Malaysian indigenous communities.

Huzair Latif covers the energy and industrial sectors. He is a graduate of Hamilton College, where he was a managing editor and long-form investigative reporter at campus newspaper the Spectator.

Conner Searfoss is a reporter covering restructuring and bankruptcy. He graduated from the University of Maryland with a degree in International Relations.

Michael Cohen is an M&A researcher at The Deal. Prior to joining to The Deal, he worked as a research analyst for the digital marketing agency, ITOHaus. He graduated from the Eugene Lang College of Liberal Arts at The New School with a degree in Politics.

Ben Steel is an M&A researcher at The Deal. He previously worked at Bloomberg Businessweek after graduating from New York University.